Well, I have been practicing magic for well over three years now consistently, and many more years than that since I was young, just doing the odd show to friends and family but I have soon been encouraged to get out and potentially make some money on the side. I am 23 years old (24 in November) so age here is not an issue. I am currently in contact with a theatre manager close to home. I have set up an audition with the audience manager to do close-up magic in the lobby before shows and possibly during intermission as well. This could potentially be a great opportunity to get my name out there to a large portion of the, as I like to call, theatrical-minded public! Lots of fairly big names come through this theatre too so it could be very interesting.

My audition is on Thursday, I plan on taking a small press package with me with a letter of intent, business card, and link to my webpage. I will also be doing a few effects of course, to showcase what I would be doing on a regular night in the lobby at the theatre. ACR-ending with Clutch, Spongeballs, maybe liquid metal, Lethal Fours by Gregory Wilson, just enough to get the manager interested! Wish me luck!

Do your most impressive magic, and make sure you entertain. I know a friend who brings his Predators Wallet, by R. Paul Wilson, when he wants to blow away someone important. You need to do the same, with any AMAZING trick you feel comfortable with.

The manager and his assistants were very impressed. (even though I was a little nervous and messed up a little bit here and there...but hey, I'm human, and I covered quite well)

Before I showed a few effects, the manager flat out told me that he is unsure if magic is right for a theater environment...what he means, and he explained himself is that there is a fairly short window as to when patrons arrive at the theater, then move to their seats, and he does not know if having a mass of people crowding in the lobby is such a great idea. I agree with him in those regards. I basically told him that what I do involves moving from small groups of people to another group doing a couple effects for each group, lasting a few minutes each.

I then showed them Liquid Metal, then ACR, then some spongeballs, then some slight coin work. Everybody was very impressed and the manager took my business card and link to my website and he said is going to be in contacts with some people to get me some gigs!

Sounds promising, anyways, overall things went fairly well, I am definitely going to get back to practicing some more and honing my skills as much as I can and wait to hear back from the theater manager!

I just heard back from the theater, they have confirmed they want me for a post-show cocktail party this Saturday October 11th! Very excited indeed. They approved my asking price, i just e-mailed them to find out what the dress code is (so I can dress appropriately) as well as I asked permission to pass out my business card at the event! I will be back to let you guys know how the event went, wish me luck!

Well, the theater post-show event was last night from 10pm-11pm at a swanky style piano-bar near the theater. The audience manager cleared it with the restaurant manager to have me there performing for the patrons from the theater that have headed over to the restaurant.

Things went absolutely, 100% WAY better than expected. Don't get me wrong, I have been religiously practicing, researching and studying for nearly 3 years now so I definitely felt prepared and I knew I would do well, I just didn't realize the night would go SO smoothly and so well. I was essentially doing restaurant magic with all of the customers sitting at tables or at the bar. Average age I would say was around 40, with the youngest people I performed for in their early 30s probably and a the oldest would be a couple of older ladies I would say in their 60s. I performed Liquid Metal (I cleared it with the restaurant host/owner when I got there), Spongeballs, Invisible Deck, Digital Dissolve, ACR, Four for Four (from Joshua Jay's dvd set Talk About Tricks, I highly recommend this trick), Greg Wilson's Lethal Fours...umm, I think thats about it.

I would move from table to table, kind of alternating back and forth from one side of the restaurant to the other performing 2-3 effects per table. This one group I performed for I did at least 4-5 effects my first time around and then had to go back to them later and do a few more because they were so much fun! They were all laughing and joking around, yet at the same time amazed and silenced from time to time because of the magic!

By the end of the night I can honestly say I gained tons of experience from my first real paid gig. I also handed out probably at least 20 business cards for more potential clients. Even as I was leaving, I was performing Liquid Metal for a few of the staff, and they wanted one of my business cards to give back to the owner (he was busy at the time) so I may potentially have a restaurant gig lined up too!

But most importantly it was the experience and overall good time I had that will just give me more and more confidence for future gigs. Thanks to penguin magic and the forums here for all the help I have received over the last couple of years, and here's to hoping I continue this success and gain more gigs!

Joined: 27 Sep 2007Posts: 957Location: Waiting as a final load under a very large set of cups. It is dark......

trobbins2584 wrote:

Well, the theater post-show event was last night from 10pm-11pm at a swanky style piano-bar near the theater. The audience manager cleared it with the restaurant manager to have me there performing for the patrons from the theater that have headed over to the restaurant.

Things went absolutely, 100% WAY better than expected. Don't get me wrong, I have been religiously practicing, researching and studying for nearly 3 years now so I definitely felt prepared and I knew I would do well, I just didn't realize the night would go SO smoothly and so well. I was essentially doing restaurant magic with all of the customers sitting at tables or at the bar. Average age I would say was around 40, with the youngest people I performed for in their early 30s probably and a the oldest would be a couple of older ladies I would say in their 60s. I performed Liquid Metal (I cleared it with the restaurant host/owner when I got there), Spongeballs, Invisible Deck, Digital Dissolve, ACR, Four for Four (from Joshua Jay's dvd set Talk About Tricks, I highly recommend this trick), Greg Wilson's Lethal Fours...umm, I think thats about it.

I would move from table to table, kind of alternating back and forth from one side of the restaurant to the other performing 2-3 effects per table. This one group I performed for I did at least 4-5 effects my first time around and then had to go back to them later and do a few more because they were so much fun! They were all laughing and joking around, yet at the same time amazed and silenced from time to time because of the magic!

By the end of the night I can honestly say I gained tons of experience from my first real paid gig. I also handed out probably at least 20 business cards for more potential clients. Even as I was leaving, I was performing Liquid Metal for a few of the staff, and they wanted one of my business cards to give back to the owner (he was busy at the time) so I may potentially have a restaurant gig lined up too!

But most importantly it was the experience and overall good time I had that will just give me more and more confidence for future gigs. Thanks to penguin magic and the forums here for all the help I have received over the last couple of years, and here's to hoping I continue this success and gain more gigs!

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